I can't stand Johns (I thought I was the only one). I tried to jump onto Flash: Rebirth and it's so fucking convoluted and combined with Van Sciver's clusterfuck art, I was the first and only one at my LCS to drop the title. Those two are made for each other.

I've read very little Johns, but the couple of Final Crisis books of his that I did read (Red Lanterns, Legion of 3 Worlds) were super annoying and enough to make me mildly hate him.

I thought part of the problem is just that I don't follow DC books or really care at all about the characters and continuity, but then I don't care about that characters and continuity in Marvel books, either. That hasn't stopped me from enjoying most of stuff that Bendis has done and a good portion of Millar's Marvel stuff as well. For them, it isn't about these long-running, convoluted plot-lines that have been developing for years, even though those things are constantly bubbling under the surface and eventually come into the foreground for the big events. It's more about what's going on right now, and how the characters interact with each other in real time. Johns seems like just another comic book writer with a lot of big ideas who uses character dialogue purely for plot exposition. Maybe not, but that's the impression I've gotten from what little I've read.

Yeah the new Batwoman is Kathy Kane. I believe her family is also related to the Waynes somehow, she might be Bruce Wayne's cousin.

I don't really care for Van Sciver's art either so I haven't been reading Flash Rebirth and I tried reading Legion of 3 Worlds but couldn't get into it.

I don't like all of John's stuff but I think most of his current Green Lantern run and the his Wally West Flash run from the last series were really good. I think if you're not a big Johns fan but you want to give Green Lantern a shot the best place to start is with Sinestro Corps Vol. 1. I thought the earlier issues in the current Green Lantern series were okay (and it's all setting the stage for Sinestro Corps War/Blackest Night) but I didn't really get into the series until Sinestro Corps.

I totally get why some of you guys don't care for Johns, but I think his Green Lantern run has been pretty good. I think it's been way better when guys like Ivan Reis (and Doug Mahnke coming up) are the artists opposed to Van Sciver/Shane Davis/Phillip Tan.

i read the first issue of that morrison/quitely. gotta get around to the 2nd.

it's like pseudo zombies. they look like zombies but don't eat brains and the black rings are all tied in to it sort of like a possession. i'm thinking a lot of people are gonna die...only to be revived later on.

I was totally unaware of the Morrison/Quitely Batman thing. Shit, I gotta get that.

Quitely draws some weird faces, but he's probably become my favorite comic artist just from a storytelling perspective.

I agree, he's one of my favorites as well. Everything he and Morrison have done together is great. His style in Batman & Robin is a little different from his part art but it's still really good. I thought the art in the second issue was better than the first. Sadly after issue #3 there are going to be two other artists on the book and Quitely is coming back for three more issues starting with #10.

I usually don't like Quitely's art because of the faces. Before this, We3 was the only thing he'd done that I'd had no art issues with.

Yeah, I'm saying I like him in spite of them.

I've never seen anyone say that Frank Quitely draws great faces!

And yet they're effectively expressive when you're reading the story. It's weird.

wow. So Green Lantern continues to get more fucked up.

I wish I cared more about Barry Allen. I'm sure I'm supposed to, but I really just wanna know why Oliver Queen isn't in there.

did anyone else read the latest issue of the Boys? oh, shit!

i need to go catch up on shit but i forget where i left off.

Yeah, I think I missed an issue or two of Herogasm, and I can't tell if the books have anything to do with one another. But this last Boys has Butcher just attacking shit.

I downloaded the entire Age of Apocalypse thing some time ago, only now I'm realizing that a)I don't have the time to red this shit and b) it isn't really as good as I seem to remember it being.

Yeah, I still have all the issues and tried to go back and read them all a few years ago. It's pretty awful, really. Even the Warren Ellis issues of X-Caliber (or whatever) aren't very good. The only decent series was Factor X. Anyway, I don't even think I made it halfway through the whole thing before I gave up.

I guess that really was the dark age of mainstream comics, though.

I think it just made me hate the x-men even more. There's so much bullshit continuity that I can't be bothered with it anymore. Aside from that Whedon Astonishing series, I can't think of any really great X stories since, I dunno, before Rob Liefeld showed up?

Actually, that's not true. I do enjoy a lot of Peter David's X-Factor stuff.

X-Factor was good for a while, but it seemed like the same thing happened to Peter David this time that happened on his original run. Crossovers and other bullshit interfering with his long-building sub-plots caused him to wrap them up too abruptly. Only this time instead of leaving the book after that, he's hung around and just coasted. I gave up a while back.

There was a recent Dark Reign annual of Uncanny X-Men that I liked a lot. It just focused on Emma Frost and the Hellfire Club, and was one of Fraction's better mainstream superhero stories, I thought.

I don't read any of the general continuity X-books, though. I think one of the biggest problems with that whole franchise is that it's just too popular. They know they can sell tons of different books and spin-offs of those books every month regardless of quality, as long as the art seems decent at a glance. If there were only two or three X-books like there were prior to the '90s, they might have some chance of being good.

Just in case you weren't aware, Warren Ellis took over Astonishing X-men, and it has been very good so far. That's the only x-book I read now. I read a couple issues of the Utopia thing, just because I like Matt Fraction and wanted to give it a shot. It seemed pretty lame. Not horrible or anything. Just not that good.

for some reason I just couldn't get into the Ghost Boxes thing. The art was okay, and I'm a big Warren Ellis fan, but it felt like he had this book all written out with original characters and then got the gig, so he just plugged the x-men into it.

I read a bit of the Fraction thing, it's okay. Might have an interesting turnaround, but I'm not reading 8 books for it.

I forgot about Grant Morrison's New X-Men. I never read it, but that does seem to be pretty popular, even if he killed off Jean Grey for the hundredth time.

Has she been dead more than alive at this point?

also, if anyone hasn't checked out Chew yet, I recommend it. It's runny and gruesome and fucked up and entertaining all at once. It reminds me of Fell in a very superficial way, but I can see this getting really fucked up before it's over.

aw man, i miss Fell.

I have no idea what happened to that book. Is John Cassaday drawing it?

Whoa, John Cassaday drawing Fell? Sounds too good to be true.

And I haven't really been able to get into Warren Ellis's Astonishing, either. I know that whole story arc just wrapped up (haven't read the last few issues), and is he staying on after that?

I've also been kinda disappointed in Simone Bianchi's art on that. I really loved his stuff on that one Seven Soldiers book, but here it just seems to be all flash, no substance. It pulls me out of the story more than in.

nah, I just mean Templesmith has taken for fucking ever to get this last Fell out, much like Cassaday still swears he's working on that last issue of Planetary.

Another major issue with Astonishing for me is the way that team have managed to insert various steampunk motifs in the book, which I roundly loathe.

So what comics do you guys buy each month, and have set aside for you at the LCS?

The reason I ask: I've been out of the comic scene for many years, mostly because the only store within 100 miles closed. There's a new store in my town opening up though, and I've got some disposable income that I wouldn't mind tossing to the owner, who seems a decent guy. I used to be a 90% marvel kinda reader, with the various batman titles being my main DC purchases. I also used to dabble in the smaller Dark horse type publishers, but have no clue what non-marvel/DC titles are worth reading anymore.

So: if you had to make a list of 10 or 15 titles a fairly sophisticated ex-comic geek should read today, I'd appreciate it!

the walking dead
incognito
the boys
daredevil

i dunno, i'm out of the loop too, though by months not years.

well, it's kind of a weird time because the status quo is pretty fucked up with both Marvel and DC. The Green Goblin runs SHIELD in the MU and at DC, Superman lives on the moon and Batman is (sorta) dead. Even stranger is that both those books have been amazing.

My problem is that I download issues and buy trades because I don't have the inclination anymore to hold on to single issues and attempt to preserve them. I'll list my favorite books coming out in issue form right now, but my list of favorite current books would probably read a lot differently.

DC

Batman & Robin - With Dick Grayson as Batman and Damian Wayne as Robin. This is still a new book, but it's already a great read and deliciously fucked up as per Grant Morrison's being, well, Grant Morrison.

Superman: World of New Krypton - this might require some back reading, but this story has been amazing so far and I think it's only gonna get better.

Detective Comics - Right now this book is about the new Batwoman character and the new Question. The art in both cases is jaw-dropping, and I trust Greg Rucka enough to stick with this for awhile.

Secret Six - This isn't the highest-brow of books, but it's a lot of fun and outright nasty at times.

Scalped - gritty pseudo-noir set on an Indian reservation. I don't know why I avoided this book as long as I did, but it it's a great read.

MARVEL

New Avengers - this hasn't been amazing in a short while, but it hasn't sucked yet, either. I feel like this is going to get really good in the next issue or two, now that the whole sorcerer supreme thing is over. I could be way off on that, though.

Invincible Iron Man - I've always thought this was a shitty character, but now he's being hunted like a dog and trying to damage his own brain, so I will keep picking this up.

Amazing Spider Man - I don't really read this book, but people say it's been really fantastic. I think it's published like 3 times a month right now, but 3 different creative teams (?)

IMAGE/OTHER

Chew - There's only been three issues of this, but it's already good enough that I know I'll be reading i for at least 5 more issues. I don't wanna describe it because I don't really think it helps the book. But I can't recommend this enough.

Walking Dead - I used to be a huge zombie fan, but this might be the best treatment of the scenario I've seen since the shopping mall. This book can't come out fast enough.

Whiteout - This is only available in trades, but it's a fucking great book. There's a movie and a third volume on their way this year, though.

there's also like 4 great Garth Ennis books right now, though I'm not sure if they'd be up your alley. I enjoy them all for different reasons, but they're all pretty fucked up in their own way.

That's what I'd list without knowing too much about your preferences. There are some books I didn't list just because they're all bogged down in some bullshit (Green Lantern) are always late (Daredevil, Incognito), or might be changed drastically in the immediate future (Invincible, Captain America). anyway, I hope it helps.

Powers is supposed to relaunch in the fall, and I guess that's something I'm really excited for...

Do you only want to buy stuff that is being published monthly/regularly as single issues at the moment or would you prefer to read paperbacks/graphic novels?